Lifetime non-smokers now majority

A majority of Cincinnati area adults has never smoked, for the first time in the 14-year history of regional health survey. In addition, more than 60 percent of adults ages 18 to 29 have never smoked.

Area adults smoke at a higher rate than the nation’s, a study shows.
Enquirer file One year after Kenton Countyâ??s controversial ordinance banning smoking in most public places took effect, both sides say the issue remains unresolved. The Enquirer/Patrick Reddy KY 15 SMOKE KY APRIL 13, 2012 Detail photo of a cigarette being smoked.The Enquirer/Patrick Reddy(Photo: Patrick Reddy, Enquirer Media)

A majority of Cincinnati area adults has never smoked, for the first time in the 14-year history of regional health survey. In addition, more than 60 percent of adults ages 18 to 29 have never smoked.

Yet one of every 4 adults in the region is a smoker – a rate that continues to be above the national average of 20 percent, new data from the Greater Cincinnati Community Health Status Survey shows. Rural and poor people are the most likely to smoke.

“The good news is that the smoking rate in Greater Cincinnati has been steadily decreasing, down from 35 percent in 1999,” said Ann Barnum, senior program officer for healthy choices about substance use at Norwood-based Interact for Health. Interact sponsors the survey. “However, the smoking rate is still double that of the (region’s) Healthy People 2020 goal of 12 percent, so we have a long way to go.”

Smoking rates were significantly higher in rural areas, although they are falling in the Northern Kentucky counties of Bracken, Carroll, Gallatin, Owen and Pendleton and the Southwest Ohio counties of Clermont, Adams, Brown and Highland. Rates in Southeast Indiana were the same as in 2010, the poll showed.

Butler, Clinton and Warren counties had the lowest smoking rate in the region, at just 20 percent of adults.

The poll found the smoking rates for whites and blacks were virtually the same in 2013, with 1 in 4 adults in each race smoking although the rate fell faster for blacks from the last poll in 2010.

In addition, the new poll shows the rate of smoking for people in poverty was 48 percent, virtually unchanged from 2010. The rate for people living at 200 percent above the poverty level dropped to 16 percent, mirroring the trend since the survey was started.

Meanwhile, smoking rates among those with less than a high school education have increased from a low of 47 percent in 2005 to 54 percent in 2013. Smoking rates have declined for all other education levels since 2010.

The poll underscores how “support from a doctor or other health care provider can play an important role in helping adults to quit smoking,” said Dr. Barbara Tobias, a family physician and a member of the Interact board, in a news release.

Current smokers were asked if a doctor or other health care provider had ever offered help or counseled them to quit smoking. Responses varied widely across the region, with the lowest rates of help offered in Southeast Indiana (49 percent) and the highest rate in Boone, Campbell and Kenton counties (74 percent).

Women reported being offered support to quit more often than men, even though an equal percentage of men and women are smokers. Poor people, older people and people with poor health were also more likely to report being offered help to quit.

The current poll, by the University of Cincinnati’s Institute for Policy Research, is based on phone interviews with 4,929 randomly selected adults from Aug. 20, 2013 to Jan. 19, 2014. The margin of error is plus- or minus-1.5 percentage points.⬛